The Sun spoke with Dr. LouAnne Giangreco, the clinicians’ team leader, to discuss her experience on the front lines at the epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic in the U.S.

“We wanted to be able to relieve our colleagues downstate,” Giangreco said, adding that the volume of COVID-19 cases in Ithaca had “decreased significantly,” allowing the healthcare workers to answer Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s (D-N.Y) nationwide call for aid.

The clinicians were split between Weill Cornell Medical and New York Presbyterian Hospital in lower Manhattan, where the vast majority of the patients they treated had COVID-19 — and many were in critical condition.

Giangreco described the scene at the hospital intensive care units as alarming.

“[The patients] were on multiple IV drips, required a lot of ventilator support as well and were on ventilators for a long period of time. [It] was pretty remarkable,” she said.

The clinicians managed patients facing many different significant COVID-19 complications such as kidney failure that resulted in a need for dialysis treatment and clotting or bleeding disorders, according to Giangreco.

Due to the long period of time that many were on ventilators, some patients needed tracheostomies — a surgical procedure in which hole is made in the front of the neck and into the windpipe to support longer-term breathing. Tracheostomies typically provide better breathing support than ventilators.

Over the course of the month, more and more patients were transferred out of the intensive care unit to rehabilitation floors. However, this was just the beginning of a long recovery process.

“These are patients who had been sedated and paralyzed with medications for a long period of time, so there are now a notable number of patients that require extensive therapy [to recover],” Giangreco said.

The clinicians were also concerned with their own exposure to the virus. To mitigate the risk of becoming infected with COVID-19, Cayuga Medical staff were provided with personal protective equipment such as N95 masks, hair covers, face shields and gowns.

New York Presbyterian, which oversees both New York City hospitals, provided the staff with scrubs to be laundered onsite so that they could wear their street clothes back to a hotel that temporarily housed the clinicians.

“We were very fortunate that we had great support down at NYP in terms of employee health. If anybody had any concerns, there was a COVID hotline to be able to call and to be tested,” Giangreco said.

All staff were tested for COVID-19 upon their arrival to Ithaca and the Taughannock Inn has donated rooms for the clinicians who wish to be isolated for two weeks after their return.

In the case that an employee did test positive, Giangreco said that Cayuga Medical followed the best practices of the New York State Department of Health, keeping people out of work and monitoring symptoms and carefully determining when it was safe for the individual to return to work.

Giangreco did not confirm whether any staff members tested positive for COVID-19 during their time working in New York Presbyterian and did not share the number of people who chose to isolate upon returning to Ithaca. However, Giangreco confirmed that no one required hospitalization or extensive medical care.

“We’ve always known that New Yorkers have a strong fortitude,” said New York State Sen. Tom O’Mara (R-Elmira) at the send-off ceremony on April 8. “We will prevail and we will succeed because we are New York strong.”

Around 200 full-time CMC employees accepted a furlough offer, the Ithaca Times reported on April 21. The voluntary furlough program is the latest staffing adjustment made to compensate for a 50 percent decline in patient volume, according to Dr. Martin Stallone, chief executive officer of Cayuga Health, in a statement to The Sun.

This move comes after Cayuga Health, a network that runs Cayuga Medical and Schuyler Hospital, reassigned some employees to its coronavirus testing center at the Shops at Ithaca Mall and sent others to support New York City hospitals.

Cayuga Health said it has been helping staff better understand the benefits that are available to them before they make the decision to volunteer to be furloughed.

Hospital spokesperson John Turner told the Ithaca Times that employees that elect to be voluntarily furloughed will retain their health insurance, be eligible to apply for state and federal unemployment benefits, and will receive a stipend after returning to work.

However, Stallone said the majority of Cayuga Health’s workforce remains “on the job.”

CMC stressed that the furlough program will be short term, especially after Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-N.Y.) announced that starting this week, elective surgeries can resume in hospitals located in counties deemed to have a low risk of a surge in COVID-19 cases.

Tompkins County falls in that category along with most counties in the Upstate region, except neighboring Schuyler County, where the state continues to monitor the rate of new COVID-19 infections.

Non-essential surgeries have been postponed at Cayuga Medical since March 20 to direct medical resources toward treating COVID-19 patients and to help curb the spread of the virus.

As elective procedures are typically a hospital’s most lucrative service, the wave of cancellations has sharply cut into Cayuga Medical’s bottom-line, making cost reduction a priority.

“Earlier this month, I met with my senior leadership team as we agreed that more will be needed to maintain our financial health as one of the largest employers in Tompkins County,” Stallone said in a statement.

As a result, the medical center announced significant concessions to cut expenses, including a reduction in senior leadership salaries.

Cuomo has said that states will eventually reopen on a regional basis, giving hope that healthcare systems may soon get much-needed financial relief. In addition, the governor announced monetary and administrative aid for all New York State hospitals, with a focus on community, rural and safety-net hospitals.

“We want to emphasize that we expect all of our employees to return to work when our volumes and revenue return to normal levels after New York State implements its re-open plan,” Stallone said.

Their efforts included a sampling center that opened on March 24 in the parking lot of the Ithaca Mall, replacing a drive-through testing center.

Tompkins County “currently has adequate capacity” to test every resident who meets current testing guidelines, Dr. David Evelyn, vice president and chief medical officer of the Cayuga Health System, wrote in an email to The Sun.

“The sampling site was designed to be expandable” and additional sites can be built using the same model as needed to address a sudden uptick in potential cases, Evelyn wrote.

The sampling site has the capacity to test up to 1,000 patients a day, according to WSKG. As of Wednesday evening, TCHD had tested a total of 2,546 people.

Cayuga Health has chosen to “centralize” testing to a few locations in order to preserve personal protective equipment and testing materials, as well as “develop the capacity to meet a surge demand of testing as it occurs,” Evelyn wrote.

Once tested, it takes about two or three days to receive test results, Dr. Doug MacQueen, infectious disease specialist at the Cayuga Center for Infectious Diseases, told the Ithaca Voice.

Samples are tested at the Wadsworth Lab at the New York State Department of Health, where — similar to many labs across the country — tests are backlogged.

MacQueen said that the “next urgent need” is to expand testing capacity in labs.

“We heard for a couple of weeks now that testing capacity would be expanded, but so far it hasn’t been,” MacQueen said to the Ithaca Voice.

Evelyn said that commercial labs and hospitals across the state are “gradually” starting to do their own testing to cut down on the backlog at Wadsworth, adding that Cayuga Medical Center hopes to start in-house testing in the “near future.”

In addition to the sampling center, Cayuga Health is also expanding its testing options to include a test for COVID-19 antibodies, Evelyn said.

The most immediate application for this new option is to “identify potential plasma donors to treat active COVID-19 patients,” Evelyn wrote. Cayuga Medical is partnering with the Mayo Clinic in a clinical trial to treat the illness using donor plasma.

While most of the tests in Tompkins County have come from the sampling center, urgent care centers, including the Convenient Care Center at 10 Arrowwood Drive, and the emergency department at Cayuga Medical are also available for those who need a primary care evaluation in addition to a test, Evelyn added.

Tests are administered via nasal swab, and if a test returns a positive result, the patient will be quarantined until follow-up tests show two consecutive negative results.

Cayuga Medical Center sent a request to the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences on March 16 for three different kinds of swabs in anticipation of a future shortage. However, Evelyn wrote that Tompkins County is “currently in good shape” for all testing supplies.

Evelyn also praised the partnership between Cayuga Health and TCHD in addressing this crisis, specifically Cayuga Health’s contributions to the region’s “provider network and testing capacity” and the latter’s efforts in strengthening public health education and infrastructure.

]]>https://cornellsun.com/2020/04/15/tompkins-county-ramps-up-covid-19-testing/feed/1Cayuga Medical Center Collects Homemade Masks, Tablets to Combat Supply Shortagehttps://cornellsun.com/2020/04/15/cayuga-medical-center-collects-homemade-masks-tablets-to-combat-supply-shortage/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss
https://cornellsun.com/2020/04/15/cayuga-medical-center-collects-homemade-masks-tablets-to-combat-supply-shortage/#respondThu, 16 Apr 2020 02:55:33 +0000https://cornellsun.com/?p=6517278For those looking to help out with the response to the coronavirus, the Cayuga Medical Center Foundation is seeking donations of medical supplies, homemade masks and tablets.

Cayuga Medical Center is also accepting homemade cloth masks, which will be worn by healthcare professionals. Volunteers can attend an on-site mask-making event at Bartels Hall which has distanced stations set up, or they can make masks from home. Those interested are asked to fill out a sign-up form.

Volunteers have sewn over 3,000 masks for healthcare workers, since mask-making production began on March 24 at Bartels Hall.

Before they can be used, all donated homemade masks are washed and sanitized in the medical center’s on-site laundry and sterile processing departments.

Courtesy of Cayuga Medical Center

Volunteers worked at surgical mask making stations at a Bartels Hall practice court on March 25, with tables spaced to practice safe social distancing.

Hospital wards, including the Cayuga Medical Center, have restricted patient’s families from visiting to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. To facilitate video calls between patients and their families, the hospital is also accepting iPads and other tablets.

Prof. Kim Overby, science and technology studies, is one of the Cornell faculty members spearheading the effort to gather the devices and said that it was emotionally important for patients to be able to connect with their families.

“Families are so distraught when they can’t talk to their loved ones. We want to make a difference as quickly as possible,” Overby said.

Since collections began in early April, several dozen have already been donated. Overby estimates 150 devices are needed to meet the project’s goals.

Devices must have a front-facing camera and should be reset using Apple’s instructions. They must be donated in a zip-close bag, with a power cord if possible.

Tompkins County has 116 positive cases of coronavirus at the time of publication, a number that the Tompkins County Health Department updates each evening.

Martin Stallone, CEO and President of Cayuga Medical Group, said the medical group remains committed to serving the community and is grateful for the donors’ support. So far, Cayuga Medical has received donations from over 50 local businesses and schools, including donations from many Cornell departments like civil and environmental engineering and fiber science.

“Cayuga Health is proud to support our physicians, nurses, healthcare professionals, and administrators who are working tirelessly to respond to the COVID-19 crisis while continuing to provide high-level care to our region,” Stallone said in an April 2 statement.

All donations can be mailed to the Cayuga Medical Center Foundation on 767 Warren Road Ithaca, NY 14853 or dropped off at this location between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. on Monday through Friday

]]>https://cornellsun.com/2020/04/15/cayuga-medical-center-collects-homemade-masks-tablets-to-combat-supply-shortage/feed/0Tompkins County Announces Second COVID-19 Related Death in County, Testing Site Closurehttps://cornellsun.com/2020/04/11/tompkins-county-announces-second-covid-19-related-death-in-county-testing-site-closure/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss
https://cornellsun.com/2020/04/11/tompkins-county-announces-second-covid-19-related-death-in-county-testing-site-closure/#respondSun, 12 Apr 2020 00:18:06 +0000https://cornellsun.com/?p=6502742A second patient died from complications related to COVID-19 at Cayuga Medical Center, the Tompkins County Health Department announced Saturday evening.

The patient was one of two individuals transferred to Cayuga Medical Center from New York City, the Ithaca Voice reported. The other patient also passed away from COVID-19 complications on Friday. Neither were residents of Tompkins County.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-N.Y.) had previously announced that some patients would be transferred to upstate hospitals — including Cayuga Medical — to relieve pressure on New York City’s overwhelmed health care system.

The health department also announced that, due to inclement weather, the COVID-19 testing site will be closed on Monday. The site — located at The Shops at Ithaca Mall — was closed on April 9 and 10 due to high winds.

Monday’s weather forecast calls for wind gusts of up to 45 miles per hour and thunderstorms, according to the National Weather Service.

In a statement, Tompkins County Legislature Chairwoman Leslyn McBean-Clairborne expressed her condolences for the deceased: “We’re all New Yorkers, and we all have a role in stopping the spread and caring for others.”

Tompkins County has 113 confirmed cases of COVID-19 as of Saturday evening.

]]>https://cornellsun.com/2020/04/11/tompkins-county-announces-second-covid-19-related-death-in-county-testing-site-closure/feed/0First COVID-related Death Reported in Tompkins Countyhttps://cornellsun.com/2020/04/10/first-covid-related-death-reported-in-tompkins-county/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss
https://cornellsun.com/2020/04/10/first-covid-related-death-reported-in-tompkins-county/#respondFri, 10 Apr 2020 16:01:12 +0000https://cornellsun.com/?p=6494489A patient at Cayuga Medical Center died from coronavirus complications on Friday — the first reported COVID-19 death in Tompkins County. The patient was a transfer from New York City.

“Earlier this week, we received a compassionate transfer of two patients from New York City,” said Cayuga Medical CEO Dr. Martin Stallone in a statement. “Unfortunately, one of those patients passed away this morning. Our hearts go out to the patient’s family during this difficult time.”

After Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-N.Y.) said that some patients in New York City would be transferred to hospitals in upstate New York, CMC accepted two transfers from the city, according to Stallone.

Tompkins County has 107 confirmed cases of COVID-19 as of Friday morning. Due to inclement weather, TCHD also announced that its testing site would be closed on April 9 and 10.

]]>https://cornellsun.com/2020/04/10/first-covid-related-death-reported-in-tompkins-county/feed/0‘Healthcare Heroes’ Honored at Cayuga Medical Send-Off to New York Cityhttps://cornellsun.com/2020/04/09/healthcare-heroes-honored-at-cayuga-medical-send-off-to-new-york-city/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss
https://cornellsun.com/2020/04/09/healthcare-heroes-honored-at-cayuga-medical-send-off-to-new-york-city/#respondFri, 10 Apr 2020 03:36:20 +0000https://cornellsun.com/?p=6489243The Cayuga Health System sent two buses with 60 doctors, nurses and staff to New York Presbyterian Hospital on April 8 at 8:30 a.m., in response to a nationwide plea from Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-N.Y.) for healthcare workers to come to New York City.

The Ithaca Police and Fire Departments and a NASCAR pace car from Watkins Glen International led the procession, as hundreds of community residents lined the parade route to cheer on the departing healthcare workers, even though Cuomo recently extended a statewide stay-at-home order until April 29.

For residents who have been cooped up in their homes since a government-mandated shelter-in-place was issued on March 20, the celebration was a welcome respite. Many held up encouraging handmade signs and banged pots and pans together.

Michael Suguitan / Sun Staff Photographer

Members of the community wore masks and held signs to thank the medical professionals on their way to aid the fight in New York City.

Before the procession began, politicians and community leaders, including Dr. Marty Stallone, CEO and president of Cayuga Medical Group, gave speeches in front of Cayuga Medical Center lauding the departing healthcare volunteers.

“In every crisis there are those who run not away from the struggle but towards it. We normally call those individuals heroes. Today we call them doctors, nurses and healthcare professionals,” Stallone said. “You’re an example of what it means to pursue a calling in medicine, nursing and healthcare.”

Stallone thanked attendees for “practicing generous social distancing and for wearing masks,” though many comments on the Cayuga Medical Center’s livestream of the event noted that the speakers and those in the crowds were standing less than six feet apart from each other.

President Martha E. Pollack also gave remarks remotely over Zoom, expressing gratitude for the healthcare workers for their contributions to New York-Presbyterian, which is affiliated with Weill Cornell Medicine.

Michael Suguitan / Sun Staff Photographer

President Martha E. Pollack made an address via Zoom during the send off about the partnership with Weill Cornell Medicine.

“Your colleagues at New York-Presbyterian Weill Cornell Medicine will be so, so grateful to have you,” Pollack said on Zoom. “I say this with certainty because I speak to them almost daily to say that they are thrilled, just thrilled that you are coming to help.”

Cornell donated two Campus-to-Campus buses to transport the healthcare workers to the city.

According to Stallone, Cayuga Medical Center is the first example of an upstate community hospital contributing its workforce to a state and national effort. He anticipates this trailblazing effort will become common practice across the country.

“We have shared this model with the Hospital Association of New York and there will be other hospitals to follow us in our footsteps to help in this endeavor,” Stallone said.

The clinicians are expected to be based in New York City for at least 30 days. Stallone offered reassurance to the volunteer clinicians that they and their families will be cared for during this time.

“You’re not alone. Know that your brothers and sisters at Cayuga are thinking about you, praying for you and rooting for you,” he continued. “We have a particular debt of gratitude to your family and we commit to supporting them in whatever way they need. This will be a priority for us.”

Michael Suguitan / Sun Staff Photographer

Politicians spoke during the send off about their gratitude and the efforts to make the partnership possible.

Assemblymember Barbara Lifton (D-N.Y.) — who represents Tompkins County — also assured workers they will have proper personal protective equipment during their deployment. Healthcare workers were sent some supplies for their own use and to help out with equipment shortages.

“I know personally from helping work on this that there are many people that have been working overtime to make sure their hospitals and nursing homes have all the protective gear they need,” she said.

Rep. Tom Reed (R-N.Y.) assured the community that local leaders will be united in their efforts to coordinate responses against the ongoing pandemic.

“[The speakers today] have been talking for about a month and a half daily about the issues that we are facing with COVID-19,” Reed said. “But I also tell you we talked not as adversaries in the political arena, but we talked as Americans. When America is challenged, we come together as Americans and we support each other and we do not fail.”

For New York State Sen. Tom O’Mara (R-N.Y.), community strength has always been a part of the state’s identity.

“We’ve always known that New Yorkers have a strong fortitude,” O’Mara said. “This really proves it today. We will prevail and we will succeed because we are New York strong.”

Michael Suguitan / Sun Staff Photographer

Sixty doctors, nurses and staff from Cayuga Medical Center left for New York Presbyterian Hospital to support COVID-19 efforts in New York City on Wednesday.

Stallone hoped that volunteer clinicians will return to Ithaca with skills and insights that will equip them to better handle the crisis months to come.

“COVID-19 is a challenging disease. You’ll come back as the providers foremost expert in diagnosing and treating it,” Stallone said. “You’ll ensure that we employ the latest and best practices here in Ithaca if and when that care is needed to any great extent, though we pray it is not.”

]]>https://cornellsun.com/2020/04/09/healthcare-heroes-honored-at-cayuga-medical-send-off-to-new-york-city/feed/0Photos: Ithaca Medical Workers Head to NYC to Fight Pandemichttps://cornellsun.com/2020/04/09/photos-ithaca-medical-workers-head-to-nyc-to-fight-pandemic/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss
https://cornellsun.com/2020/04/09/photos-ithaca-medical-workers-head-to-nyc-to-fight-pandemic/#respondThu, 09 Apr 2020 16:17:18 +0000https://cornellsun.com/?p=6486610Two Campus-to-Campus buses full of Cayuga Health doctors and nurses received a community send-off on Wednesday, as 64 medical professionals traveled to New York City to fight the COVID-19 pandemic on the frontlines.

In response to Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s (D-N.Y.) call for medical help in New York City, Cornell and Cayuga Health partnered to send doctors and nurses to New York Presbyterian Hospital.

Ithaca mayor Svante Myrick ’09 and U.S. Rep. Tom Reed (R-N.Y. 23) were in attendance at the send-off event. Cornell President Martha Pollack attended via Zoom and thanked the volunteers for their work in a situation that is “both unprecedented and incredibly challenging,” the Ithaca Journal reported.

“We will continue to do what it takes to fight this epidemic and meet the healthcare needs of our community and beyond,” said Martin Stallone, the president and CEO of Cayuga Health, the Journal reported. “We may be a small community, but our employees have huge hearts and we know that we can step up and help out in a big way.”

]]>https://cornellsun.com/2020/04/09/photos-ithaca-medical-workers-head-to-nyc-to-fight-pandemic/feed/0After Cuomo’s Plea for Help, Cayuga Medical Sends Two Buses of Clinicians to New Yorkhttps://cornellsun.com/2020/04/07/after-cuomos-plea-for-help-cayuga-medical-sends-two-buses-of-clinicians-to-new-york/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss
https://cornellsun.com/2020/04/07/after-cuomos-plea-for-help-cayuga-medical-sends-two-buses-of-clinicians-to-new-york/#respondWed, 08 Apr 2020 03:20:32 +0000https://cornellsun.com/?p=6478620As New York City continues to face shortage of medical professionals in its fight against COVID-19, the Cayuga Health System is sending two buses full of doctors, nurses and staff to New York Presbyterian Hospital.

“They [New York Presbyterian] have seen a huge surge in patients, so this provides relief to the team that has been working non-stop,” said John Turner, vice president of public relations for Cayuga Medical Center.

New York City currently represents the global epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic, leaving local hospitals desperate for medical equipment and personnel. Although public health officials expressed hope that the rate of hospitalizations may be slowing, almost 700 New Yorkers died of the virus on Tuesday in the city’s deadliest day yet.

With a daily influx of patients overwhelming medical capacity, on March 30, Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-N.Y.) issued a nationwide plea for healthcare professionals to aid in combating the outbreak: “Help New York. We are the ones who are hit now.”

That call for help elicited a broad response, with Cayuga Medical’s team joining thousands of other healthcare workers that have shipped off to the hard-hit city in recent days.

According to Turner, the doctors, nurses and support staff will be paid for the duration of their 30 day assignment by New York Presbyterian, which is affiliated with Weill Cornell Medicine and is one of the city’s largest hospitals.

While clinicians are bringing some of their own protective gear, New York Presbyterian assured Cayuga Medical that its clinicians would be adequately protected there as well, Turner said.

The group of medical professionals will depart Ithaca on April 8, with a send-off ceremony to commence at 8:00 a.m. that will feature Rep. Tom Reed (R-N.Y.), Assemblywoman Martha Lipton (D-N.Y.) and Mayor Svante Myrick ’09.

Our hospital is sending two busloads of doctors and nurses to New York City to help in the nexus of the pandemic.

“Together with our essential workers, like police, firefighters, facilities workers, food and grocery workers and others, they deserve every support we can offer them as they help to meet the critical human needs in this crisis,” Pollack said in a Cayuga Medical press release. Cornell donated the use of two Campus-to-Campus buses that will transport the clinicians to New York City.

Both Myrick and Cayuga Medical encouraged residents to support the efforts of the medical professionals by attending the send-off ceremony, or by showing support along the bus route. For those that cannot make the event in person the event will be live-streamed on Cayuga Medical’s Facebook, according to Turner.

The effort began when Carol O’Driscoll, director of surgical services for Cayuga Medical Center, noticed bags of “blue wrap” in a hospital hallway. There is currently no shortage of the material, which hospitals normally use to wrap used surgical instruments. O’Driscoll’s research revealed that the blue wrap met the permeability standards for surgical masks.

After enlisting a few of her recovery nurses to create a prototype, O’Driscoll decided to move forward with a community effort to upcycle the material into medical masks.

Seeking a large space where volunteers could observe social distancing rules while producing the masks, O’Driscoll reached out to the University and coordinated the use of Bartels Hall to stage a makeshift assembly plant.

Surgical mask production began on March 24, with approximately 20 volunteers, who were required to pass a medical screening before entering. Volunteers also observed social distancing guidelines, sitting six feet apart and wearing protective equipment while they worked.

On the first day of operation, volunteers cut and sewed approximately 240 masks by hand.

The College of Human Ecology has since stepped in to help, offering its Digital Design and Fabrication Studio to speed up production.

“The D2FS has been laser cutting the hospital’s supplied materials into the necessary shapes needed to sew the masks,” Charles Beach, Jr., the studio’s supervisor, wrote in an email to The Sun. “We have a secured laser cutting room with only one person allowed in for that day.”

The effort to produce medical masks expanded after an influx of volunteers from the Ithaca community responded to the call for help. By March 30, the team had more than doubled, with two different shifts of nearly 30 sewers each.

With the assistance of a laser cutter and extra sewers, volunteers were able to quickly ramp up production of the masks, producing 520 on March 25, 1,110 on March 27 and 1,650 on March 30.

Prof. Kim Phoenix, fiber science and apparel design, has been sewing for the program since the start, but said she was most impressed by the Ithaca community’s enthusiastic response to a call for volunteers.

“Quite a few people are here sewing from the community,” Phoenix said. “[It’s] amazing what happens when you call for volunteers in Ithaca, people just show up.”

According to Phoenix, O’Driscoll has received an influx of inquiries from medical facilities across the country because of the program’s success.

“She’s been contacted by places all over the country now,” Phoenix said. “It’s being used as a model.”